Unless These Men Stay In The Ship

When last we met, Paul the Apostle, the crew, and the passengers were on a boat that had gotten lost at sea during a storm. The waves were pounding the hull of the ship. The sky had grown black, and nobody could see anything. The boat was slowly sinking and literally coming apart. The crew heard what they thought might me waves crashing on a shoreline or rocky cliff. They had taken soundings and the water was getting more and more shallow by the minute. There was no way to tell whether the ship was about to run aground on a sandy beach, ride up on a bed of boulders, or be smashed against the face of a rock cliff. The crew dropped all anchors. And they were waiting on daybreak so they could verify the layout of the shoreline. If it looked safe, they would raise the anchors and allow the waves to drive them straight in so they could safely beach the ship. But until they could see, they had to hold tight were they were and pray. The problem was not everybody was willing to listen to Paul. Not everybody believed Paul. Not everybody was willing to be patient and wait.